Turku Footblog

Anz · Post by **Anz** » 07 May 2009 10:23

My last wisdoms tooth was removed today. All four gone now. Let's see how much dummer am I.

Kjopa wrote:How long are you in the game btw?

I've been freestyling for 5Â½ years now, and hopefully will be in the game for much longer.

Antti got back to Finland from spending four months in Canada as an exchange student. Footbag wise he seems rusty, but swears he's getting back into it. We've kicked a couple times.

I always have so much ideas in my head to write about in this blog, but when I get infront of the keyboard I've already forgot everything. Better make something up right now on the spot!

Here's something I just spoke about with Antti today.
Beginning freestyling players often "cheat" tricks so that they can nail it, but only hit the trick and aren't able to play out of it. For example Clipper position, it's easy to catch far, but it makes it hard to play out of.
The main idea is that you need to be able to do every trick so that you can play out of it with any trick. An example? Watch Vasek play on his strong side.
Many beginners seem to have the image that "this trick is so hard that even nailing it is enough, nobody could play out of it anyway." Or they just don't pay attention to control and form. This is something experienced players shouldn't be scared to point out.
Now you're thinking about really hard tricks that cannot be linked. It's not that they're hard, it's that nobody's good enough.

Speaking about control, I'm noticing positive developement on my shuffle control and form. I'm not flailing nearly as much as I used to, say, two years ago, and it actually looks like I'm playing with the footbag instead of it playing with me. For example doing Rubberman > Blur > Legbeater > Blizzard > Dimwalk > Rubberman > Blur > Legbeater > Blizzard > Dimwalk > Rubberman with good control is quite satisfying.

At the moment I'm in the middle of the last training program before starting to practice routines for Worlds. This is an interesting program because it's quite simple, practically basics, but I'm mixing some cross training with it.
I need to find a routine song too, which is always irritating.

There was something else I wanted to cry about, just can't get it into my head right now. I'll write it down for the next blog entry when I remember it.

I was thinking about filming a solo freestyle video in the spring, but don't really feel like it. Let's see after Worlds.
At least I filmed those Plasticman drill variations, like I promised.

Statement of the day: Don't fight gravity, co-operate with it.

Muffinman · Post by **Muffinman** » 07 May 2009 13:08

The FF8 song had a really good rhythm to it. It was flowy and very routine-conducive, I felt.

Anz · Post by **Anz** » 25 May 2009 09:49

The FF8 song (Waltz for the moon) isn't that good routine song because it repeats the same over and over, but it's good for demos.

I choce my routine songs. Two, and I've used both before. I have now gone through them both thirty times and the coreography is starting to settle. I just need to get comfortable with them and get them in my spine. Anyway, I shouldn't need as many repetitions for either one than I did for the Finnish championships in December (which was 220 reps). Perhaps because it was my first planned and practiced routine ever.
Man, routines are nice to practice. But doing ten routines per session, five each, really makes you done for afterwards.
I'm not sure what would be the best way to practice them, but I do first one five times, then change the routine. And on each session change the starting routine, of course.
I think changing the routine every time would get confusing, although it would divide energy much more equally for both. You just need stamina!
Anybody willing to share a better way?

Something I wanted to talk about was the term freestyle and what it means in this sport. Occasionally I see the term even abused. Sometimes players cover up their weak spots in the game by claiming it's freestyle. I've never checked the dictionary, but I don't think freestyle equals "no control". I don't think freestyle equals "bailing like hell". It's freestyle and we all want to have just fun, isn't that it? Well if you'd actually practice a little bit the freestyle part of the game would be much more fun. All these one-trick-wonders don't know what they are missing. What especially makes it all perverted is all this filming and YouTube. Try a trick a hundered times in front of the camera untill you nail it. That's freestyle nowadays.
Just look at the latest online competitions here on Modified. Makes me sick.
Then there's this bailing. Of course everybody does it on some level, but does the community have to talk about adds making them so crucial, so that every newcomer instantly has the word "Guiltless" in their minds.
This always leads to wrong training methods and wrong priority concepts. Then every single player has their game build on Butterfly, Osis and Spinning/Ducking Clipper. Now is that freestyle? You can see that it's the footbag playing with the player, not how it should be.
When you play, do you actually freestyle? No - you just play according to you habbits, do the tricks that are in your spine. Freestyle would require constant concentration. That's why I think freestyle is the worst possible way to practice. You're just enhancing the old manouvers and links. Think about that the next time you freestyle.
A beginner learning to bail to Osis is doing a terrible mistake. Osis is like the worst bail ever, just think about it. It's a hard concept to learn so that you can actually control it, and it's a pretty hard trick itself. Learn to control the frikking footbag, not let it control you.

I've still been skooling my prefix Symple Legovers. Yesterday I gave that milestone a try and hit both sides with about five tries, which was quite surprising. I'm talking about Vasek's Massive Combo: Bedwetter > Smog > Pigbeater > Smog > Pixie Whirl (> PS Whirl > Mobius > Ps Whirl). I hadn't tried the whole combo before, but I thought it would take longer to nail it. Today I filmed the combo including the last three tricks as well. Now I can definetly say that Symple Legovers aren't my weakest concept anymore.
I'd probably name Drifters as my weakest concept now. Need to start training them.
Massive combo

http://www.footbag.org/gallery/show/-16607

I think everyone should be aware of their weakest concepts, both uptime and downtime, and pay some extra attention to them on each session. I'm talking about basic concepts, Pixie, Stepping, Atomic, Fairy, Quantum and Whirl, Drifter, Double Down, Symple Legover. Intentionally leaving a concept out of trick selection is just stupid. Also not being able to name any weak concept either makes you a bloody good player or a beginner - probably the last option. You need to know you own game, and the weakest concept weakens the rest.

Statement of the day: You can never practice basics enough.

Post by **Zac Miley** » 25 May 2009 11:04

Your blog is great. Thanks.

abstract · Post by **abstract** » 25 May 2009 11:12

nice post, anz. i always appreciate your thoughts on the sport & training methods.

i agree with your thoughts on freestyle & know that i myself have succumbed to these bad freestyling habits in the past so much so that they still present themselves in my every day shred if i am not focusing on my trick selection.

i still bop a lot, but i feel my form on all my tricks has improved enough that i don't really feel guilty about bopping, whereas in the past i was bopping for the sake of maintaining guiltless, which as you say is getting ahead of where a player's progression might actually be.

for many concepts i cannot play guiltless yet, but there's nothing to be ashamed of in that regard, it is best to be able to acknowledge where you are as a player. doing nice, clean illusion dexes are way better than working in sloppy pdx illusions just to up the difficulty. i think coming to grips with that realization is what a lot of new players are lacking.

Muffinman · Post by **Muffinman** » 25 May 2009 17:26

Aww, you didn't even try the superduperfly

I love how I knew the combo before I watched the video, just from "Vasek massive combo". Sick bothsidedness as always!

g00d33 · Post by **g00d33** » 25 May 2009 18:09

Howdy, I have been/am guilty of a lot of what you write about beginners these days. It really helps (me at least) when someone like you makes a post like this. It helps to point myself in the right direction again in my development and training.

Thank you

Lazy-Bonez · Post by **Lazy-Bonez** » 26 May 2009 02:36

nice post about freestyle and development in general.
thanks for making me think of some things

PoisonTaffy · Post by **PoisonTaffy** » 26 May 2009 05:40

Great post, although you have a way of harshly presenting an uncompromising opinion (especially dissing the online comp thing).

Personally, I recently realized that I kinda fucked my game by worrying too much about tiltless and, later on, guiltless. They are totally overused buzz words.

Anz · Post by **Anz** » 01 Aug 2009 10:02

Alraight, Worlds have passed. I'm glad they're only once a year, 10 days of footbag makes my head dizzy. But also it's always a fucking blast.

Worlds in Berlin
Routines were the only discipline I practiced this year and I was satisfied with how I did. My only goal was being in finals and after placing 6th out of eight I was pleased with that. I also did fine in the other competitions, placed 6th in Request, 5th in Shred30 (with a pretty much improvised shred!) and 3rd in Sick3, which I didn't think I deserved, but cannot say I was unhappy to come back home with one medal. In circle semifinals I just fucked up my mental game and played really my worst game in the whole tournament, which was a shame, but I didn't have any expectations anyway.
I played footbag pretty well at Worlds and there were occasionally some cameras involved. *cough*MÃ¤cro*cough*
I won't do any write up since you'd hate reading it. Just big thanks for all those who hung out with me - you're the gov'ner posse

Vasek Manual
Dan Ednie and Vasek made a "how to play footbag" manual. I just finished reading it and must admit that it's 95 pages of good stuff. I'll brag that it's kinda like the same stuff I've been writing on modified for quite a while now, but Vasek goes deeply into the mental game of footbag and has many special tips that I had never thought of. There's a couple details I would argue with him, but I'll just let his success speak for himself. Despite the horrid grammar I recommend buying and reading it.

Anz Trikz
I'm still planning on making the new tutorial videos and I was going to discuss about them with people at Worlds. Silly me, ofcourse I was too busy doing everything else around the clock for ten days... Anyway I want to make them good, so I need to plan them ahead. Starting after next week, because I'll quit my job then (starting studies later this month). Then I'll have plenty of time. Any requests, tips can be e-mailed or PM'ed to me.

Finnish Talent
The producers of the Finnish Talent competition called me and asked me to come. Seems like a good way to promote footbag and the ones invited are surely on tv, so no chance of losing anything. The qualies are next Friday and Saturday. I don't know when they'll be out the tv, probably later in autumn.

Oh yeah, check out my avatar, isn't that a cool particle accelerator?

Cultural fact of Worlds 2009: DÃ¶ner kebap is all a shredder needs.

Tjuggles · Post by **Tjuggles** » 02 Aug 2009 22:07

Anz,

It was really great meeting with you and watching you shred. Also, thanks for all of the tips that you gave me. I am looking forward to watching your future vids.

Oh, sorry I didn't film you like I said I wanted to do; time flies at Worlds...
I'll take a rain check.

TJ

mahhkohh · Post by **mahhkohh** » 04 Aug 2009 22:37

mÃ¤crÃ¶ is a bit busy *cough*lazy*cough* so the video may take a few days more. also all this slomo stuff is realy confusing to edit, because i dont want to bore people... but it will be out soonishly.

Anz · Post by **Anz** » 13 Aug 2009 07:20

Hey MÃ¤cro, what gives?

Anz Trikz
I've started planning the tutorials and it's looking good. Probably film them next week.

Finnish Talent
Last weekend I was at the Talent qualifications. On Friday they had the pre-qualies where they cut out all the crappy enough not to perform in front of TV cameras. On Saturday we had an audience and the whole show. I did a routine to James Bond Theme (1:40 long) on both days. On Friday I had a dropless routine, but then sadly on Saturday in front of the audience I had two drops (ATW and Pincher if I recall correctly

), but still the judges were impressed and I passed on to semifinals which are in November. The judges couldn't give me much feedback, one of them said "cut the drops and add a couple of those high kicks." I think she ment to request more flyers.

Turku Summer 2009 -video
Lauri visited Turku for a couple days and yesterday we spent a session filming with both normal video camera and the Exilim. We looked for great spots rather than good shred and I left some good shred out from the video too. It's the first video where I use both normal and high speed footage. I Had some problems converting the mov-files, had to make them mpeg1 first so that Movie Maker could process them and that resulted with low resolution.
I won't post it in a separate thread, so here it is: http://www.footbag.org/gallery/show/-17187

(no more crappy statements of the day)

mc · Post by mc » 13 Aug 2009 08:16

yo! that video is sick!!!! thanks for sending it to me; I might not have seen it at the end of that last post!

Asmus · Post by **Asmus** » 13 Aug 2009 08:44

Super sick video Anssi!

And props on Finnish Talent, let us know when some videos hit youtube.

Looking forward to the new Anz Trikz.

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 13 Aug 2009 15:36

I'm speechless... I'm gonna watch that vid everyday for the next month. Super duper kiitos man. Ugh. So good.

Tuukka · Post by **Tuukka** » 13 Aug 2009 22:24

Great to see Lauri playing! Some very nice combos there.

mahhkohh · Post by **mahhkohh** » 14 Aug 2009 02:35

krasser shit! cool video. good to see lauri play, he has such a nice style!

Anz · Post by **Anz** » 10 Oct 2009 04:24

Autumn greetings to you all.
I started studying in Turku University of Applied Sciences. It's a bachelor degree in electronics. To my surprise I have now problems fitting school and footbag together. I thought I'd have more time than I had when I was working, but I have to study home a lot too, so it proving difficult. But I'll manage.

Anz Trikz
I filmed and edited all the new tutorial videos in about two weeks. It took approx. 30 hours of work though, which was tiring. I still need to double check all the videos. I'm uploading them on YouTube in November most probably.

Talent
I did advance to semifinals in the Finnish Talent. My semis pool is in four weeks from now. I was looking for new bags to suit better for demo purposes. Marco Hartig made these for me.
The yellow-black is a regular size 32. These bigger bags have a diameter of about 7 cm and they weight 80 grams. Not the easiest bags to shred with, but quite good for demo purposes. The thing about Talent that bothering me is that I have to sign a deal with quite strict terms even to attend the semifinals.

Shred
There's been a couple videos of me on the video section lately. I do Triage a few times in the Season ender video by Lauri. The trick has sort of "clicked" on me. It feels so natural nowadays. This week I hit some links with it, for example Triage > Alpine Legbeater and Whirring Swirl > Triage, which I find cool.

Finnish Champs in December and then NYJ in January. Can't wait.

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 10 Oct 2009 06:07

Good luck with school. Balancing school and footbag is really tough.

Anz wrote:I do Triage a few times in the Season ender video by Lauri. The trick has sort of "clicked" on me. It feels so natural nowadays.

That's awesome; I love how that trick looks. The random triages in that video were my favorite part of it.